2009-01-05 ARISS Status

Amateur Radio on the International Space Station (ARISS) Status Report
January 5, 2009
1. Upcoming School Contacts
Axam Jatiya Vidyalaya in Guwahati, India has been scheduled for an Amateur Radio on the International Space Station (ARISS) contact on Wednesday, January 7 at 08:01 UTC via telebridge station W6SRJ in California. Approximately 1300 students are enrolled at the school. All students are taught in Assamese with English taught as a compulsory second language.
Tongfu Road No. 1 Primary School in Guangzhou, Guangdong, P.R. China has been scheduled for an Amateur Radio on the International Space Station (ARISS) contact on Saturday, January 17 at 10:23 UTC. The school is over 70 years old with an enrollment of over 1000 students. An amateur radio club was established at the school in 2007 and during the same year a team from this school won the national youngster's amateur radio contest. Elective courses on amateur radio, space technology and ARISS are offered to the students. All grades have participated in essay and cartoon contests to prepare for the contact. Students have written letters to the astronauts and determined the questions to ask. Media coverage is planned with newspapers, television and the internet.
2. Technopolis Contact Successful
On Saturday, January 3, students visiting Technopolis in Mechelen, Belgium experienced an Amateur Radio on the International Space Station (ARISS) contact via telebridge station VK4KHZ in Australia. The students asked Mike Fincke, KE5AIT, 16 questions with time left over to exchange Season's Greetings. Approximately 100 students, parents and ham radio operators attended the event. Three television stations and two newspapers reported on the contact. The audio was fed into the EchoLink AMSAT and JK1ZRW servers and received 29 connections from ten different countries including the Ukraine and Romania. More information on the contact may be found on the ARISS-Europe Web site. See: www.ariss-eu.org/2009_01_03.htm
3. ARISS 25th Anniversary Special Event Update
To celebrate the 25th anniversary of ham radio in space, an Amateur Radio on the International Space Station (ARISS) commemorative event will be held during the month of December through mid January. A special certificate is being developed for those who communicate with the ISS, either 2-way direct (with the ISS crew, the digipeater, or cross band repeater), or 1-way reception of SSTV or voice downlink. For more information and an update on this event, see: http://www.rac.ca/ariss/oindex.htm under "Latest News."
----
Sent via sarex@amsat.org. Opinions expressed are those of the author.
Not an AMSAT member? Join now to support the amateur satellite program!
Subscription settings: http://amsat.org/mailman/listinfo/sarex